GALAPAGOS 1

Our first glimpse of a marine iguana

Male frigate with his red balloon out to impress all the girls!

Galapagos sea lion and pup

Sea lion snoozing, as most of them seem to spend nearly all their time doing!

Frigate bird

 Tuesday 7 December

We had a late night before our journey to Galapagos. And once in bed, neither of us seemed to sleep well – we were both so incredibly excited about the next part of the holiday. Our yacht, Isabela II, holds 40 passengers, and is in the luxury class of boat touring the archipelago (which means we have about 10 or 11 passengers to 1 naturalist guide, and the yacht has lovely food and amenities). For us, the trip is particularly nice – due to an early-bird special, we scored the ‘Owners Cabin’ (which is a slightly larger cabin) at not much more than the regular double cabin price.

After our briefing and safety drill, we headed ashore at North Seymour (on the island of Santa Cruz) and were immediately floored by the proximity and number of animals. The naturalist guides must be regularly amused by tourists ‘just off the boats’ going ape over the first sea lion and taking photos of it madly, not believing him when he says that we will see hundreds more, just as close. At this spot we did see many sea lions of all sizes, marine and iguanas, magnificent and great frigates (that’s their names, not our choice of adjectives), blue-footed boobies and other smaller lizards and birds. One of the most lovely moments was when a week old sea lion was calling to his mother, and she was answering him, and watching them galumph their way across the sand and rocks towards one another, calling in a ‘marco, polo’ like fashion as they went.

Impressive whiskers!

Thinking of this as an expedition cruise, rather than a luxury one, we have come a little under prepared in the clothing area. People seem to still ‘dress’ somewhat for dinner, and we are stuck rotating the 2 ‘smart’ outfits each that we brought with us (leaving the rest of our stuff in the B&B in Quito). Oh well. We still look fab! Dinner was a 4 course meal, and they are making quite a bit of a culinary effort for us vegos (there are quite a few on board).

Juvenile booby

John, North Seymour

Nic, North Seymour

A favourite - the blue-footed booby. So cute!

Wednesday 8 December

What a lovely change to have a wake-up call at 7am instead of 5:30am! Bliss!! Breakfast, as with all of the meals, has options varied and plentiful. Nic even indulged in nutella on toast – chocolate withdrawals have kicked in!

Espanola Island

Espanola mockingbird trying to get to the water

The island we visited today was Espanola (English name – Hood), with our first disembarkation at Gardner Bay. It was a wet landing where we strolled along a soft, white sandy beach amongst sea lions, sunning and playing and suckling, all apathetic to our presence. On occasion, a curious sea lion would approach to investigate the tall visitors, but if they got too close we backed away, as instructed by our guides, and continued along the beach. Highly amusing were the Espanola mockingbirds, who knew that the water bottles we all carried contained that very precious substance – fresh water. They followed at our heels and along side us, like dogs, glancing up to see if we were going to give them what they wanted. Whenever a daypack was put on the ground, they were straight at it in an attempt to get at the water in the bottles. All this is because years ago, twits began giving them water, so now they can’t really be bothered finding it themselves. Some humans are knobs!

Nic snorkelling

Striped salema fish

In the morning we went deep-water snorkelling and saw lots of King Angel fish, yellow tailed surgeonfish, and parrot fish. Other people saw manta rays and sea lions frolicking, but we haven’t had that pleasure yet. Nic got cold in the water after about 30 minutes and called it quits. That is something that was quite a surprise – being near the equator, one would expect that the water is warm, like in any tropical environment, but it’s not. At this time of year, the water is only about 17°C (which for John is fine, but Nic prefers Fiji water temperatures – that of a warm bath!).

Nic and sea lions

Such a cutie!

Mum just wants to sleep, but he wants some quality time

Stunning Christmas marine iguanas, found only on Espanola

The afternoon’s dry landing was at Punta Suárez (also on Espanola) and we saw oodles of sea lions, stunning Christmas marine iguanas (so called for their red and green colours), blue-footed boobies (a big favourite!), Nasca boobies and albatrosses (both adults and juveniles). One of the cutest walks on any living creature is that of the albatross. It’s almost like a cartoon – like the bird is trying to be funky or cool, but is quite gormless, but nevertheless, endearing! In fact, they almost walk like a new Commedia dell’arte character, a cross between Pantalone and Brighella.

Galapagos hawk

Galapagos crabs, stunning against the black volcanic rock

Nasca boobies, which, thanks to too much testosterone, are the bullies in the Galapagos bird world

We saw an odd briefing/presentation that evening in the lounge aboard Isabela II – it was lots of old black and white footage of the first white people who lived on the Galapagos islands – an eccentric German dentist and his lover (neither of who had any teeth!!), who had an unusual relationship with a donkey (footage of her holding his front legs trying to make him dance with her!). Gummy Germans living with a donkey in the Galapagos in the 1930s. Odd indeed.

Vegetation on Expanola

Another fabulous Christmas marine iguana, very ostentatious!

Thursday 9 December

This morning began with a wet landing on Santa Maria Island (Floreana Island) at Punt Cormorant. We walked to a brackish lake in the middle of the island, which is usually where the flamingos gather, but it was the wrong time of the year. Shame. We continued walking to another beach where we saw some green sea turtles and a small manta ray swimming along the shore. We weren’t allowed to partake in any activities on that beach, due to it being a location for turtles mating and birthing. Saw a giant blue heron elegantly catching fish – the Audrey Hepburn of birds, so graceful and stylish, but doesn’t try to be!

Many feet on the panga

Yellow warbler

In the afternoon we had a deep-sea snorkel around a large chunk of volcanic rock rising out of the sea. The water was the clearest we have ever seen. Nic swam with a juvenile sea lion, that came right up and looked into her face, only an arms length away – magic! Also saw 3 white tipped reef sharks, circling below us – so graceful – had no interest in us whatsoever. Saw oodles and oodles of fish, many we hadn’t seen before, and in huge numbers. Best snorkel so far. Enjoyed the Jacuzzi afterwards, rinsing the wetsuits after our snorkel adventure – nice way to warm up after the cold water.

Mexican hogfish

Yellow tailed surgeon fish

White tipped reef shark

Blue winged bee

Our last activity of the day was visiting Post Office Bay. The original purpose of this barrel sitting in the middle of nowhere, was for passing sailors to call in and pick up anything that was addressed to where they were going (leaving anything not in the vicinity of their destination), and hand delivering it. So they try to keep this little tradition alive by encouraging us to ‘mail’ a postcard (by dropping it in the barrel), and taking any that we are able to hand deliver. Lovely idea – we’ve taken 4 to deliver around Sydney when we get back. Quite a few fools didn’t actually address the postcards – either not quite understanding the concept, or lacking belief that the cards would ever get to their destination. Still fools!

Crab

We savoured some champagne before dinner whilst talking with a lot with new friends. Can’t believe that there are still four days to go!

Delivery of the post at post office bay

The passengers of Isabela II at Post Office Bay

Beautiful giant blue heron

SACHA LODGE

Boarding our motorised canoe on the Napo River at Coca (which is a 2 hour trip to Sacha Lodge)

The back of some other tall, grey-haired gent, not John, on the walk to the Lake.

Our second canoe ride (no motor this time), to the lake on which our lodge nestles.

Sacha Lodge, from across the lake

Nic on her way to the cabin and glimpsing black mantle tamarins and a pygmy marmoset

Friday 3 – Sunday 5 December

Pygmy marmoset, the smallest monkey on earth (would fit into the palm of a hand)

We left our excess baggage at Casa Aliso and embarked on our journey to Sacha Lodge on Lake Pilchicocha (nearest town Coca). The flight was only half an hour with Tame airlines, most pleasant (and much more room than our 6 hour flight to Quito from Santiago!). Hilarious to hear Lionel Richie playing over the tannoy while we were taxiing before take off. What is it with Ecuador and their adoration of ‘classic hits?!’

Arrived safely in Coca where we were bused all of 5 minutes to their downtown office (right on the Napo River). Had sandwiches for lunch and piled into large covered motorised canoes and hooned down the river for about 2 hours. It was overcast by then, and it was quite nice, fanging along with the wind blowing in the hair (which, for Nic, did not recover for the 3 days in the Amazonian jungle – just like Monica in that episode of Friends when she went all frizzy). Once we reached the landing point for the lodge, we walked for another 20 minutes before getting into smaller, regular canoes on the lake for a 15 minutes ride to our final destination. This whole approach to Sacha Lodge by water was just like we were in a movie – gliding across black, still water, with everything clearly reflected in its surface – absolutely magical.

Our room

We were certainly lucky with our accommodation. We had the best cabins – a very large room built on stilts and accessed by walkways, with a king size bed, ensuite and all walls were of wood and flyscreens (with half length curtains to draw for the evening, so that fresh air still circulated throughout the night, with the help of the overhead fan). We had a ‘back deck’ that was surrounded by the rainforest that was completely private, and housed 2 comfortable chairs and a hammock. It was just like living in a tree house, only with flushing loos and a hot shower and protection from the mozzies! And being an eco-lodge, we once again had to deal with not being allowed to put the loo paper down the loo, but in a bin next to it (in fact, this is quite common in Ecuador, generally).

The dining room and bar of Sacha Lodge

Leaf grasshopper on steps in bar

The lodge issued us with wellington boots for the duration of the stay, and they were very handy with all the traipsing through mud and getting in and out of canoes. So with the ‘wellies’ combined with the jungle attire, and Nic’s abandoning of all efforts to tame her mop of curls, we were quite a sight – especially since John was issued with the only pair of bright yellow boots at the lodge – so much for discretely sneaking up on wildlife!

View from bar towards canoe dock and lake

We were also blessed with our Naturalist Guide, Sebastian, and our Native Guide, Wilma, who were both lovely, gentle men, who were highly intelligent and knowledgeable and VERY patient!

We have had mixed luck with our wildlife sightings here. On the way to our room on the first afternoon, we also got lucky with our animal watching – we saw 2 black mantle tamarinds, and a pigmy marmoset (the smallest monkey in the world), all only a couple of metres from us. As a group, however, we have seen a few frogs, some grasshoppers, millipedes, a snail the size of a large grapefruit, many birds and lizards, while other groups have seen tarantulas, anacondas and monkeys frolicking…But they must have been in groups with softly spoken members – our group…not so much!!

On our way to 'The Tower'

One of many birds whose name we can't remember!

The bottom of the viewing tower...

...and the view from the top - straight down!

Bromeliad from tree top

Our naturalist guide, Sebastian

There were two particularly lovely walks (of many) our trusty guides led us on – a canopy walk (about 50m above the ground), which comprised of 3 towers with 2 suspension bridges between them. The other involved a canoe ride across the lake and through some beautiful channels to the Kapok Tree Tower (also about 50m above the ground) from where we could observe all kinds of different birds, including woodpeckers, toucans, parrots, many different types of taningers, crested ‘this’ and speckled ‘that’, bewildering in the vast array of species and colours and wondrous beauty. Even got to see a couple of howler monkeys sulking in the rain.

Our indigenous guide, Wilma

One morning we headed out early (the wake-up knock at the door always came at 5:30am!) down river to see the parrot clay-lick. This is where thousands of parrots hover in trees (the same colour they are, which makes them difficult to see!), until some brave leader swoops down to the clay-lick and the minions follow. Problem was, they didn’t. We tried several different clay-lick locations, and got to see first hand how patient true birdwatchers are – but we ain’t! We had about 4 hours in total of waiting with not much action. Got some reading done, though. Oh, and we did see a lizard…and come cute indigenous women doing a wedding dance. The highlight of the morning really was watching a sharman smoke out the nasty spirits from the young woman from Chicago. He looked about 200 years old, but we later found out he was 42!! Unbelievable. Talk about hard life!

Spare time was spent on the back deck of our little tree house, and we were lucky enough to see 2 squirrel monkeys in a tree, just metres from us. Adorable!

John atop the tree tower, in his subtle yellow boots!

Conger ants

Looks like a designer garden, rather than the Amazonian rainforest!

A butterfly from the butterfly hut

Closer!

Our final night at Sacha Lodge was delightful. It began with a night canoe ride on the lake where we hit the jackpot with our sighting (TWICE!) of a 3 metre long black caiman. Sodding brilliant! The closest we got to him was a couple of metres. We followed him through the water for a while and then he did a submarine number on us, before we discovered him again close to shore. Amazing. With the torch shining on him, he looked like he glowed in the dark. From there we ventured into one of the channels off the lake where we saw some bats who swooped at the insects attracted to the torch the guide was wearing on his head. Just like drunk fighter pilots! On the way back through the channel, Sebastian turned his torch off and him and Wilma navigated the turns of this waterway completely in the dark. It was so magical with the only light being from the fairly lights of the fireflies in the trees and the stars, with Jupiter shining like a beacon among them.

Nic and others on canopy walk

Stunning orchid

Cute lizard

The night ended in a huge BBQ (with plenty of vege options!) – in fact all of the food was fantastic…and neither of us got sick! Our group was the last to leave the dining area, as we chatted and joked and bought drinks for our guides. In bed, we once again drifted to sleep to the accompanying sounds of the rain, birds, cicadas, frogs, and howler monkeys!

For more information on Sacha Lodge, go to: Sacha Lodge

Distant volcano